


she doesn't allow anyone to comfort her (someone already came and left)

by aletterinthenameofsanity



Series: even if it costs my life (I won't stop loving you) [7]
Category: Coco (2017)
Genre: Backstory, Betrayal, Character Study, F/F, F/M, Infidelity, Love, Murder, Pre-Canon, Psychological Trauma, Strength, Strong Female Characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-24
Updated: 2018-02-24
Packaged: 2019-03-23 10:23:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13785483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aletterinthenameofsanity/pseuds/aletterinthenameofsanity
Summary: She tears his face off of their few photos, refuses to speak his name in her house. She takes what strengths she has and convinces the old widower at the edge of town to teach her his trade. She tosses her wedding ring in the river and swears to never even think her tramposo of a husband’s name.(If that pendejo ever returns to her house, she will cast him out. She will toss him out like yesterday’s trash, let him feel what she did when the letter arrived.)Imelda Rivera is strong. She builds a business with her own two hands, finding ways to keep her hija fed and herself from becoming the town puta. She has always been strong, but now her spine becomes steel. Her mind becomes an iron trap, her hands callous from shoemaking and her tongue becomes a whip.Imelda never gets to be a widow. She gets to be the jilted wife, the scorned bride, but never the widow. She never even gets to know if her husband is dead or not. His foto certainly never makes its way onto her ofrenda, where she’d have to stare at the face of everything she lost.And after a couple of decades of hurt and resentment, she finds she doesn't much care.





	she doesn't allow anyone to comfort her (someone already came and left)

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "La Bikina", covered by Karol Sevilla.
> 
> Also, this first chapter was written almost entirely written to “La Bikina”- the version by Karol Sevilla- and “My Boy” by Billie Eilish.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Title comes from "my boy" by bilie eilish.

For months, Imelda has no doubts that Héctor will return.

She doesn't like that he's gone, doesn't like that he refused to stay with them (damn his pride), but she understands his yearning to share his music with _el mundo._ He understands his desire to provide for their _familia_ using the talents he possesses.

And then the letters from Héctor stop arriving. For three weeks she gets nothing, to the point where she’s just about to leave Coco with Oscar and Filipe and go searching for Héctor on her own (damn the dangers of her being a single woman on her own- she has her wedding band, and besides, if Héctor’s in danger, then she will walk to the ends of the earth to save him).

Then the letter from Ernesto arrives, and her world shatters.

Héctor, that _bastardo,_ that _hijo de puta,_ he _cheated_ on her, he _left_ Coco-

She tears his face off of their few photos, refuses to speak his name in her house. She takes what strengths she has and convinces the old widower at the edge of town to teach her his trade. She tosses her wedding ring in the river and swears to never even _think_ her _tramposo_ of a husband’s name.

(If that _pendejo_ ever returns to her house, she will cast him out. She will toss him out like yesterday’s trash, let him feel what she did when the letter arrived.)

She shuts her doors against music, refuses to let what destroyed her _familia_ in. (She doesn't want to hear the music that kept her marriage together, the sweet notes that led to her falling in love with the _bastardo_ who broke her _corazon.)_

Imelda Rivera is strong. She builds a business with her own two hands, finding ways to keep her _hija_ fed and herself from becoming the town _puta._ She has always been strong, but now her spine becomes steel. Her mind becomes an iron trap, her hands callous from shoemaking and her tongue becomes a whip.

(If Imelda ever thinks of that _pendejo’s_ smiling face, his kind way with Coco, she immediately distracts herself with other thoughts. That _bastardo_ cheated on her after promising her the _mundo_. He abandoned Coco, who he claimed to love so much.)

Coco falls in love with the butcher's boy, marries, has kids. Imelda never falls in love again, never lets her heart get close to being vulnerable. She has a _familia_ to protect and she can't let some _cabron_ shatter her _familia_ again.

Imelda never gets to be a widow. She gets to be the jilted wife, the scorned bride, but never the widow. She never even gets to know if her husband is dead or not. His _foto_ certainly never makes its way onto her _ofrenda_ , where she’d have to stare at the face of everything she lost.

And after a couple of decades of hurt and resentment, she finds she doesn't much care.

(Except for the nights where she lies in bed and only then, with the lights off and Coco occupied with her growing _familia_ , does she let herself be wistful for the days when she first fell in love, the days before her husband cheated on her and abandoned their _familia._ The days when she had hope, and faith in something other than her own two hands. _)_

 

When Imelda dies, she is greeted in the Department of Family Reunions by her two brothers, who died a couple of years ago. She slaps them for getting into that car accident- they’d swerved to the side to avoid hitting a cat- but then hugs them. She really did miss them.

In the Land of the Dead, she finds a house that her brothers moved into when they died. She finds that they have made a small shoe repair business, and she immediately helps them expand their business in the Land of the Dead into one that rivals the _familia_ business back in the world of the Living.

Then the _maldito musico_ shows up at her doorstop, and she can't believe his audacity. How _dare_ he presume to beg anything of her with the way he treated her?

She chucks a shoe at his head, and wishes that she had thrown an iron-tipped boot instead. There is nothing she can do to truly make him pay for everything he did to her and her _familia._

  


She welcomes every _familia_ member that joins her down here. When Victoria, Julio, and Rosita die, all within a few years of each other, she gives them rooms in their house, helps build additions onto the main house to provide rooms for whoever needs them.

When Victoria falls in love with Lefstebany Costello, some part of Imelda's heart aches when she remembers the days of her courtship, back when she believed her _bastardo_ of a former husband to be an honest man. Every time the two women kiss, hold hands, smile at each other like they’re each others’ _sols_ , she finds it hard to forget a time when she loved a foolish _musico._

Thankfully, there are enough differences between Lefstebany and Imelda's former husband to keep her from getting too heartbroken. Instead, she welcomes Lefstebany into the _familia,_ teaching her to make shoes as a part-time job. In return, Imelda meets Lefstebany's _primos_ from the war- Antonio, Raul, Ricardo, Lena, Alejandra, and Kayla. The nights where both Lefstebany’s _primos_ and the Rivera _familia_ get together are hectic ones, often leaving trails of minor destruction in their wake.

Nonetheless, Imelda loves every part of her _familia_. She enjoys getting to spend time with them, even if that time gets rowdy. It reminds of everything she did _right_ , despite her husband abandoning her.

(Imelda never goes to the Sunset Spectacular, never even turns on their TV to watch it. The ban on music is still in full force, and she can't bear to see the face of the _mejor amigo_ of the man who betrayed and abandoned her.)

Imelda is content in her Afterlife, in her home at the back end of a neighborhood with her _familia._ She doesn’t have to worry about _bastardo_ husbands and abandonment. She likes where and how she is, and she will be happy to continue this way until the long away Final Death.

 

And then the Dia de los Muertos of 2017 arrives, and her carefully built world collapses.

 

When Miguel runs off, words of music on his lips, she can't help but remember what happened the last time a _musico_ left her. She remembers her husband betraying her, selling the songs he wrote for her and Coco to Ernesto De la Cruz to play for the world. She remembers what music did to her _familia_ , and she knows she won’t be giving up her blessing for Miguel to do the same to his _familia_ that her ex-husband did to theirs.

 

When she sings for the first time in a century, an alley behind her and a grate in front of her, she’s surprised that her voice doesn’t give out. For a singular, shining moment, she is filled with the memories of a happy life, back in the first few years of her marriage, but then she remembers what broke her _familia_ , what almost broke her, and she sets her jaw. She will _not_ let emotions get the best of her.

But then Miguel runs off again, accusing her of not caring about his dreams. Imelda _does_ , she swears, she just doesn’t want him to end up twisted like the man who abandoned her for money and women.

 

When she sees that _pendejo musico_ in the cenote with Miguel, anger comes curdling through her. This man is the reason that Miguel went running off- he nearly lost her her great-great-grandson as well as her marriage.

“You,” she hisses, and at least he has the gall to look sheepish.

 

When the words _He was trying to return to you and Coco, but Ernesto De la Cruz murdered him_ tumble out of Miguel’s mouth, Imelda freezes. She can't process this. She can't let this happen. This _can't_ have happened-

“It's true, Mela,” Héctor whispers, and her bones begin to tremble. No, a century can't have been wrong, he couldn't have been murdered, _no es posible._ He _cheated_ on her, except no, he didn't, did he, and oh _Dios-_

Then Héctor collapses onto the ground, gold escaping his joints, and she gasps in fear. No, no, he can't be being Forgotten, not if he were murdered, not if a century was wrong, because she has barely had an instant to process, to talk to him because _murder,_  he was _murdered,_ by _Dios_.

“It’s Coco, isn't it?” she asks. “You're being Forgotten.”

He nods, head bobbing weakly, and as her thoughts start to process a little better she sees the disrepair to his clothing. She sees the yellowed bones, the frayed hat, the face that barely looks a year older than the last time she saw him.

 _Murder._ He was _murdered._ Trying to _return_.

(But he left in the first place-)

“I can't forgive you,” she says, unable to reverse a century of hatred in a moment, “But I can help you.”

As Miguel helps Héctor up, her former (former? That's how she's always thought of him, but he didn't leave her, did he? He _didn't cheat_ ) husband nods. “All I want is to see Coco once before I go,” he says. “All I need is help getting the _foto.”_

“And then Miguelito will return to the land of the Living.”

Miguel and Héctor nod in unison, and it scares her to see how similar they look. Héctor scares her in general, the implications he holds now, the years rotting away along with his too-young (too-old) bones.

Héctor didn't cheat on her. He was murdered.

 _Como diablos_ is she supposed to process this?

 

When they arrive at Frida Kahlo’s studio- and Héctor knows _Frida Kahlo_ , _como demonios_ \- Imelda recognizes the urgency and pain in his voice as he begs the seamstress for clothing. It is the same way she spoke in those three weeks when he didn’t send letters, before Ernesto’s letter arrived. It’s the way Coco and Elena spoke when Victoria and Julio were dying of cholera. It’s the way that her voice strained when she had to identify her brothers’ bodies after their car accident.

(With every gold wisp that escapes his body, with every time he hunches over and, when Miguel rushes to his side, every quiet _I’m fine,_ chamaco, _don’t worry,_  her ribs ache. She did this to him, with her erasure of his name from their _familia_.)

This scheme of his, this plan to dress up as Frida’s dancers, is quintessential Héctor, at least the one that she first married. The man who wrote such beautiful songs (before he sold them- no, before they were _stolen_ from him), who wore a wedding ring (even though it was something that only women wore, because it was a sign of ownership, and he always said _Mela, that shows that I’m yours as much as you are mine_ ), who danced with their daughter and loved her unconditionally (despite the men living near them saying that he should _really_ have wanted a son, an heir).

Imelda doesn’t miss Ceci’s look of distrust as the seamstress hands her a fake skirt, shirt, and unibrow. She swallows heavily. Héctor didn’t cheat on her, did he? If Ernesto murdered him, then the letter was probably just a cover up.

She maybe, probably wants to forgive him, but a century of anger doesn’t go easily. Even if (murder, _mierda_ , _murder_ ) he doesn’t deserve her hatred.

And yet- _mierda_ , she can’t think about this. She just needs to focus on getting Miguel back to the land of the living and getting Héctor’s _foto_ back from the true _bastardo_.

 

When Imelda stands on the grandest stage in the Land of the Dead, her breath seizes in her ribs. She has sung once in a century, and that was a couple of hours ago. She hasn’t sung in front of a crowd since the days in which she and Héctor would sing in front of their friends, in Mariachi Plaza and in various homes.

She holds the microphone, and she takes a breath. The faint strains of a guitar begin to play. And then, in front of a crowd of thousands and her husband, she begins to sing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second chapter takes place in a universe where Imelda leaves home before Ernesto’s letter arrives, travels to Mexico City to find Héctor, and finds out the truth about Héctor's murder. Comment if you want to see it!


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